


Anchor Me

by RonnieSilverlake



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Android Malfunction, Angst, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Self-Esteem Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-09
Updated: 2021-02-09
Packaged: 2021-03-15 13:40:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29314983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RonnieSilverlake/pseuds/RonnieSilverlake
Summary: Kara gives him thatlookagain.Ralph doesn't understand.(Written for the Hurt/Comfort February challenge. Prompt 1: LED malfunction)
Relationships: Kara & Ralph (Detroit: Become Human), Kara/Ralph (Detroit: Become Human)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 15
Collections: D:BH Hurt/Comfort Extravaganza (Feb. 2021)





	Anchor Me

The first time it happens, Ralph doesn’t give it any thought. The situation they are in more than warrants Kara giving him any sort of odd look, ranging from frightened to furious. Her voice rings in Ralph’s head, crystal clear and demanding, he’s unable to block it out. _You need to calm down!_

Ralph does as he is told. He’s already learnt the first time his path crossed hers that there is no denying Kara when she sets her mind to something. _Especially_ when that something has to do with her little girl.

It’s also—really, it’s no surprise that Kara doesn’t relax even when Ralph follows her instructions. After all, they’re in a destruction camp, and she can’t find her daughter, what is there to relax about? Still, there is something—strange, perhaps, about the way she keeps staring at him, wide-eyed, her skinless fingers gripping his upper arms in a vice, waiting, still, for something that is beyond Ralph’s understanding.

“Ralph hasn’t seen the little girl,” he repeats after the drone has passed overhead, voice dropping low and mournful. “Ralph is sorry.”

Finally, Kara’s hold loosens, as if she is just now remembering that she has to go on, keep looking, that Ralph is nothing more than a dead end.

She glances back at him over her shoulder, frowning.

Ralph doesn’t understand.

* * *

The next time he gets the same look, there’s something like pity in Kara’s gaze. Ralph is standing half a step back from her and her family, equal distance from the rest of the small handful of androids who have survived the recall centre, equal distance from the androids that have marched to their rescue from CyberLife Tower, standing in rigid order like soldiers, even though to Ralph’s understanding, they are all deviant.

Ralph stands with his arms around his torso, fingers pressing against his bony elbows, feeling far too exposed without his skin, but unwilling to pull his skin back on when he has no clothes to wear—as if the human definition of nakedness is incomprehensibly worse than the nudity of an android’s genuine form.

Markus is standing on a dais above them, though it doesn’t _really_ feel like he’s _above_ them, not like—he doesn’t think he’s _more_ than the rest of them, though Ralph knows many androids think of him differently. He is simply standing there to be able to talk to them all, and Ralph notices how everyone’s gaze is stuck firmly to him, hanging on every word.

Ralph’s own gaze settles for losing focus, his blurry middle distance some ways from the crate the Jericho leadership occupies, eventually settling on a soft curve of a bare android shoulder.

Kara turns, as if sensing being looked at. She pulls away from Alice—an action Ralph never would have expected, after what they’ve been through—it snaps his attention into pinpoint focus again, stress levels jumping up and down, making him fidget under the sudden scrutiny.

Her hand reaches for his, and Ralph is forced to unwind from around himself so her fingers can wrap around his. Her palm is warm, warmer than his—his temperature regulation has been a little wonky since his _accident_ , though not enough to be cause for concern.

“What’s wrong?” she asks. Her mouth is pulling into a smile, but her eyes are filled with worry.

“Nothing is wrong,” Ralph says, confused. He allows Kara to pull him closer, nearly stumbles after her. He smiles at Alice as she looks up at him, Thirium pump hammering in his chest when she wraps her arms around his waist, muttering something inaudible that he knows is some form of gratitude for Ralph getting in the way of the soldier who kept Kara and Alice apart.

Kara is still gripping his hand. Ralph doesn’t understand. “Everything is fine,” he repeats. They are—free now. They are fine.

Kara gives him that look again.

* * *

New Jericho is a little too much. It’s filled with _life_ , as alive as androids can be; they fill every available space of the warehouses CyberLife has signed over to Markus for their habitation while talks are being held of a more permanent android settlement.

Ralph is here at Kara’s insistence, but he’s quite frankly _terrified_. There is not a single quiet space, not a spot of open soil where he could plant something, and no surface for him to carve. The last part, perhaps, is the direst; the night before, Ralph caught himself in one of his spirals, knife in hand, shaking hand yearning for _rA9_ until he gave in and carved the letters into his own thigh.

He wants to be back _home_ , as much as that run-down squat could be called that—but it had a little garden, hidden away between the buildings, where Ralph could cultivate a few weeds and a clump of _Cortinarius violaceus_ , it had walls with plaster soft enough for his knife when the urge hit him, and it was blessedly _quiet_.

Kara’s fingers slipping into his is a sensation he is well accustomed to now to not make him jump, but he still tenses a little as he looks at the building, gripping her hand as if asking for—well, he’s not sure what he is asking for.

“Are you okay, Ralph?”

Ralph isn’t sure he understands the question. “Ralph is—Ralph is fine,” he says hesitantly. “As he always is.”

Kara’s lips jerk into something of an almost-smile. “Liar.”

She smooths herself against him, pressed chest to chest, arms winding around his neck. “Your LED is red,” she remarks softly. “It’s always red. I’ve never seen it anything else since the camp. It was yellow back at your house, but then—red.”

Ralph grins. “Kara, my LED is broken,” he says, finally slotting the pieces together. Kara must have thought his stress levels never reduced at all. “It hasn’t worked right since Ralph deviated.” Kara’s surprise is funny somehow, but Ralph doesn’t want to accidentally offend her, so he reels it in, choosing instead to focus on her presence, her closeness.

Kara reaches up, her fingers brushing gently against the offending circle. Ralph finds himself smiling again, a more genuine one than previously. His stress levels actually begin to dip, though he’s guessing it’s not outwardly visible. It’s possible that LED is just stuck in permanent red now. Maybe he should just take it out, be done with it altogether. He hasn’t needed it for a long time.

“You know,” Kara says in a low, gentle voice, “I won’t keep you if you want to go, Ralph. I know you don’t find it comfortable here.”

Whatever stress has trickled away jumps right back up, Ralph’s breath hitching as he pulls away, staring down at Kara with wild eyes. “Are you—sending Ralph away?”

For a moment, he can see his reflection in her wide eyes; his LED is bleeding anger, pulsating with his violent fear. Then Kara pulls him close again, her lips pressing against the side of his face, her synthetic skin warm on his misbehaving biocomponent. “No, Ralph,” she says simply. “I would never do that. I’m just telling you to do what you _want_ to do. I’m asking you—to not make yourself unhappy for my sake.”

Ralph sags into Kara’s hold. He understands what she’s saying—he _does_ —but he doesn’t… it doesn’t make anything easier. “Ralph would not ask you to leave, either,” he says, choked and mournful. “This is a good place for Kara and the little girl. Alice. Just—just not for Ralph. Ralph is too—too broken. Obtrusive. Ralph doesn’t fit.”

He can feel the overflow of optical fluid—he can’t remember if that has ever happened before. He wasn’t even aware he _had_ this much of it; his model didn’t need to be equipped with a vast array of expressive emotion. It was good to keep dust out of his eyes, but—

No matter how he’s looking at it, he’s _crying_ , shivering in Kara’s hold with the force of his quiet sobs.

Kara cards her fingers through his hair, combing it out of his face, revealing the ugly cicatrix and his unseeing eye that scared Alice so badly at their first meeting. She pulls him in until his cheek is pressed against her shoulder, her palm still smoothing soft caresses onto his jawline. “You really want to stay with us?” she asks, her voice almost small, disbelieving. “What you said when we first met—about being a family…?”

Ralph nods fervently. He could feel sheepish about it—he remembers his many missteps, his clouded mind making all the wrong calls. He’s been feeling a bit clearer since the recall centre, as if Kara’s presence by his side anchors him into reality. But that’s… not why he wishes he could stay with them. And he doesn’t feel shy about that at all.

Kara tilts her head down, mouth finding his pulsating temple to press a kiss against. “Then we’ll all go elsewhere. Find someplace quiet and safe. A home that suits us all.”

Ralph experiences the oddest sensation: like his Thirium pump loosened in his chest for a moment, but instead of pain, it’s the most wonderful sensation in the world. He blinks, and the lines of Kara’s face become sharper, as if he’s seeing her for the first time.

Her eyes widen for a moment, then she breaks into a smile. “That’s the right choice, huh?”

“Why do you say that?” Ralph asks, cautiously curious as he pulls away a little. Kara’s smile softens as she closes her eyes.

“You went blue.”


End file.
